Most of the items you would use are not room specific. Maybe an Entertainment center, bedroom furniture, Kitchen cabinets might be on 3" increments. I have several libraries that I have put together for customers that order cabinets this way. If you go into a Big Box store and look at their cabinets, most are going to be modular and in 3" increments so that they can take a wall and fill it with cabinets and then use filler strips to fill the voids. Not exactly custom, but it's done everyday.

I have a couple of libraries that I build for other companies that have as many as 300 cabinets in the library. They are designed to their specifications and when they need cabinets, they just order by cabinet number. I don't have a clue how they are arranged or anything. We just cut and ship.

Design Sharing is another great idea that Thermwood had for eCabinets (like the Member Store) that met with only lukewarm enthusiasm from the cooperative members. Many people while trying to learn the software were having a hard time getting started. By purchasing a library through Design Sharing they could get a boost by having a full library of cabinets to drag and drop into a room without having to create all those cabinets. (much like the 20/20 approach to designing. Thermwood hoped there would be many libraries submitted that encompassed a huge variety of styles and construction techniques so that a new member (or an accomplished member) could purchase a collection close to their own methods of building and get started using the software. They were also looking to create a wonderful data base of other items like vent hoods, mantels, furniture pieces, island cabinets, vanities, etc. With these any member could simply search the database an purchase a unique piece and not have to create everything themselves. They would also have access to many different styles that they might not be adept at creating themselves. The greater the selection of cabinets in the Sharing Libraries the better it would be for everyone. This never caught on because it does take some effort to do, but not much. You have to create libraries to use for yourself, why not offer those for Sharing. Damon is a good candidate for Sharing, he has multiple libraries that he uses to create cabinets for customers, why not put those into the Design Sharing program?The bonus of sharing designs is that you get paid for them. I just offered the libraries I use for my everyday work in the shop. I am not getting rich from these libraries but if I need a new computer with a high dollar graphics card or my wife and I want to go to South Padre Island for a few days, the libraries can pay for that. It is a nice little bonus for "Sharing" something I had to create for myself anyway.

Thermwood has offered us many opportunities (other than free software) that we as cooperative members have let all but fizzle out.

Creating an opportunity for all the members of the eCabinet Systems Cooperative is what Design Sharing is all about.

There are a lot of woodworkers out there that may have never built a set of kitchen cabinets or an entertainment center. I started woodworking in high school building simple things like jewelry boxes, picture frames, book cases and such. If I didn't read about how to build something in a magazine or see it on New Yankee Workshop, I was a little intimidated . As the years went by and I accumulated more tools and moved up to the dbl garage instead of the shed out back, and then finally built a bigger shed out back and the wife regained her dbl garage again. I was able to entertain the idea of building more complex items on a larger scale.

I am sure there are a lot of people that just have never built some of the projects that we pump out everyday and these libraries could come in handy for a learning tool if nothing else. I have not participated in the production sharing program simply because of time constraints and not clearly understanding what all was involved in placing your items on the site to be offered.

I was talking to a fellow woodworker the other day and he was asking me if I would be interested in doing a kitchen. I asked him why he didn't do it, and he replied that he had never done a kitchen before. I told him it was basically the same as some of his other projects, just a lot more pieces to the puzzle. Get good measurements and lay your cabinets out correctly and start putting the puzzle together. Not exactly rocket science.

I would personally say that marketing has been poor in this area. How difficult would it be to maybe have an advertising section in one of the margins set to one side of the screen with pop ups or a slide show showing the different libraries that are available. How would you know what is available unless you scroll through them regularly to see if anything NEW had been added.

Something needs to change to generate some interest, the activity levels seem to be dropping on the forum. It seems as if the participation in the forum has dropped to maybe a couple dozen or so people.